What is a brain wallet?

A brain wallet is a standard wallet that generates its address by hashing a passphrase to create a private key and therefore a public key and resultant address. Seeing as a Bitcoin or a Litecoin address is usually a 256 bit string – the SHA-256 algorithm is usually used – although various levels of complexity can be added to this.

How does a bitcoin brain wallet generator work?

Typically, any Bitcoin brain wallet generator allows its users to key in random words (i.e. 4,6,8,12, or 24 words long) which is called a passphrase. This passphrase, depending upon the type of generator you are using, is hashed with SHA-256 or the Scrypt algorithm to generate a Bitcoin private key and then a Bitcoin public key.

What is a 'wallet' & how does it work?

A “wallet” is a collection of two types of numbers: addresses, typically rendered as 33 or 34-character strings like 13ignD31FysQbaBBVJUzffcQoFxxEuEcbE that allow deposit access to the address’s associated account and private keys, slightly longer numbers that allow withdrawal access.

Does electrum have a 'brain wallet'?

Note that Electrum also has a “brain wallet” functionality of its own that offers a compromise between memorizing a premade key and making a key from something you memorized: a 12-word base 1600 “wallet seed” from which Electrum generates five addresses and private keys.